Thinking of doing a music video with a good story and showing it to the world.

Not sure if anyone is interested but, here’s my pitch.

If you have a song that you have written, recorded in a studio and would like to have it on a video, please feel free to contact me and let me know your story, your song and the feel of the video. If it is something that I can do or have deep interest in your song and story, I will be shooting this for you. Please do note that the music video will be used as a piece for the above competition. (Please see terms and conditions at https://productionawards.sony.eu/terms-and-conditions )

A video made by stillmotion does enforces reasons why many photographers like myself moved from still images to moving hearts.

It’s not just capturing an image by anticipating it. It’s about writing the story for that specific audience. From start to end. To move and be moved. Live to tell your story, your vision, your excitement and your desperation.

About half a year ago, I caught a company in Singapore (yes, in Singapore) who took my friend’s wedding video as their own when they weren’t the ones who were hired for the job. The wedding highlights video which would have the actual company’s credits was removed and the audio came onto an abrupt stop without a fade off. Despite the video being uploaded by the company for more than a year, it was uncovered when I was searching around the wedding brides forum then.

Upon noticing the video being not the company who shot it, I notified the people who produced it and they gave a warning to the company who posted it. Trying to ‘steal’ someone else’s work and call it your own would probably invite more trouble to oneself than benefit. If the stolen work is better than what you can produce, you will be giving a false impression to clients that you are able to do something similar for them too. Bad publicity and reputation will be tarnished in the industry if the original producers intend to take legal action. In the above case, the producers of the video decided to let them off while thanking me for letting them know over a meal.

Do justice for your clients and yourself. You can copy camera angles, composition, color style and cuts but not steal their work. You may just be caught if your clients do google the names of the couple of a stolen video that you uploaded to ask for second opinion.

This is a post dedicated to my friend, Joanna who got married last Saturday and graciously invited me to her wedding reception at her church and dinner banquet at Novotel Singapore. I knew her when I was in Secondary School / High School and we were in the same class for the first 2 years. Even after high school, we kept in touch and I am glad she found her partner in life, Marcus. I wish them all the best in their marriage life and a great adventure ahead.

Here is a lovely video of the morning events done up by one of the teams at Alanmitchi which was played during the dinner banquet:

I was also delighted to meet my other friends who were the bridesmaids for Joanna.

Jacqueline, Me and Kaiyun

Me and Lee Wah

All four of my pretty friends have found their partners in life and 2 of them, have already tied the knot. As a wedding filmmaker myself, I am glad that they have gotten wedding videography or have engaged a filmmaker to document their wedding as it is something that they could look back when they grow old and something that their kids and grandchildren will watch together with them. To me, having any form of video capture for a wedding, be it good or bad capture, is better than no capture at all.

The Minicam mark5. A very compact and lightweight stabiliser with an arm brace to balance your camera for smooth video shots. I have tried it first hand when it was first release and although I do not personally own one of these or the earlier versions of the minicam series, I must say that it is especially good for wedding videography where you may need to carry lots of equipment if you plan to do fast cuts edits.

1. It is compact, the legs are able to fold up quickly and can be kept nicely within a lens pouch.
2. The arm brace helps the user to manage the minicam longer.
3. The total weight of the minicam is less than what you may carry in comparison to the traditional glidecam HD 2000.
4. The ends of the weights are round so that it will not poke and hurt people when gliding.

Two reasons why I am still using the glidecam pro 2000 stabiliser instead of upgrading to this minicam, the minicam is more sensitive on the fly than the glidecam as I am not used to it and it is in the price range of around S$900 which I can still survive on my existing glidecam pro. That said, if you do not own any glidecam or flycam kind of stabiliser equipment, do check out the MiniCam Mark5.

On a separate note, if you own a stabiliser of a different brand and you have the following issues,
1) Problems balancing your handheld stabilizer?
2) Problems getting smooth shots consistently?
3) Not sure if there is a systematic way to correctly balance your stabilizer setup under 5 mins, once and for all?
4) Unable to handle a handheld stabilizer to minimize fatigue?
5) Do not know why your stabilizer rocks like a pendulum when you change it’s direction?
etc…

https://www.facebook.com/MinicamSingapore is opening their studio for up to 5 participants on the 22 January 2014 for a free basic 2-hr workshops for users of handheld stabilizers. In any case the class is fully subscribed, do look out for future classes in 2014 at the facebook page.

If you are planning your wedding in the year 2014, and believe in the Chinese Zodiac Animals closely, you may wish to refer to the above dates for reference. However true it may be, will be how one determines their marriage life to be. If it meant to be, it will meant to be.

In Singapore, since our ancestors’ time, the idea of selecting a wedding date has crossed many cultures besides the traditional Chinese. Many consultants derive the auspicious wedding dates through the couple’s exact dates and times of birth, years of birth and animal horoscopes of the couple’s parents and the month and year that the couple plans to get married on. Consultants may give advice such as avoiding people with a particular animal zodiac group when they first enter and leave the bride’s house.

If you are getting married and would like to find out the dates that a traditional Chinese couple follow, below are the dates that you may note:

Consultants may also give the exact hour (Ji Shi, 吉時) in addition to the auspicious wedding dates which are applicable to the Tea Ceremonies (Jing Cha, 敬茶) and Fetching of Bride to Groom’s House (Xin Niang Ru Men, 新娘入門) since they fall on the same day with the Traditional Wedding Date.

Generally, in the Chinese Lunar Calendar, the first and fifteenth day of the month are known to be auspicious date and the seventh month is known to be inauspicious due to the belief of the hungry ghost festival falling on the seventh month of the lunar calendar.

More importantly, it is good to find a date that both families and couple agree upon due to the beliefs that may or may not be different.